Can Blockchain and Self-Sovereign Identity Systems address the Refugee Crisis - Lyonna Lyu ::

foreign [Applause] [Music] good afternoon good evening depending on where you're calling in from we have Leona here from the African entity Community doing a workshop on can blockchain and self-sovereign identity Systems address the refugee crisis this seems like a super interesting Workshop um so super excited to see what Leona is going to be presenting to us today and um that being said any questions you have can go into the chat um and otherwise I'll pass the mic off to you Leona thank you uh my name is Leona Ryu I'm an illustrator and iconographer I create nfts and I participate in a range of dolls um I was initially asked to uh discuss the ways I utilize blockchain technology as a preservation tool um which is usually what I tend to do within my artwork but I decided to kind of uh shift my focus onto a different topic that is near and dear to me because of how much it affects my personal uh my personal life and my family and because I believe this topic is in need of immediate attention and this is the global Refugee crisis and um I would like to ask questions about are there ways that blockchain blockchain technology excuse me can address the refugee crisis and provide some relief to um a lot of the issues that individuals are facing before we get started I wanted to go through a couple of keywords um decentralized identity which is a system of identity uh management for people organizations and more operating on a decentralized ledger technology I like the blockchain um next would be self-sovereign identity um this concept of self-sovereign identity is a framework for digital Technologies and identities uh that restores the power back to the individual for them to control and gatekeep access to their digital identity and the information that is contained within their digital identity and the final definition that we are going to cover is the hyperstructure which is essentially this is defined by Jacob from Zoro a hypersocial is a crypto protocol that can run for free and forever without the need for a maintenance interruption or intermediaries foreign so in the last few years uh the world Refugee crisis has risen to an alarming scale the U.N High Commission of refugees or the unhcr has recently reported in June of 2021 that or June of 2022 that 89.3 million people have been forcibly displaced um by the end of 2021. as a result directly of persecution conflict violence or other human rights violations oftentimes they are required to leave their homes without much preparation um and they end up arriving at Refugee and Aid camps without any types of form of identification or documentation um others are also losing their personal documents during their Journey to the camp um while they're trying to get there they may you know like lose it and others are also coming into camps from States and Nations whose governments have uh collapsed and are maybe unable to issue ID cards for example like Syria or Somalia following the collapse of its previous government foreign not having a proof of citizenship also creates problems for nation states who are accepting refugees for Relief organizations most refugees and displaced persons arrive at camps with no proof of identity or documentation and out of desperate need humanitarian relief organizations are resorting to registering and identifying people in the meantime unfortunately these databases that they're creating tend to remain and stay siled Within These or these eight organizations and this is going to drastically impact how quickly people are receiving aid later on down the road because they're not able to take these forms of identification with them if they happen to leave by blockchain's nature of being of immutability decentralization and ownership this technology of tomorrow's internet gives us the potential to for it to be transformative for humanitarian work if we are able as the blockchain community to approach these very specific problems with an intention of finding an ethical solution IDs are extremely crucial to accessing basic human rights and Necessities like registering for a bank account registering um for a phone applying for school or even accessing a Facebook account nowadays is going to require you to have some form of government-issued identification in order for you to um log in nowadays many nowadays many refugees and individuals are left stranded with their palms up without any types of ID without proof of identity identification um refugees and migrants are also unable to travel through these official checkpoints at the international borders this is this means that they're going to have to turn to some more dangerous channels um in order to reach their destination such as smuggling without a form of identification refugees who are seeking Asylum are also um turned away by issuing blockchain based digital identity Solutions we are able to build on top of a decentralized ledger um to alleviate some of these issues that displaced people are having in the last few years relief organizations have been attempting to close the ID Gap with decentralized identification the centralized identification refers to a system of ID management for people organizations and more via the use of decentralized Ledger Technologies like the blockchain in order to create a portable form of identification organizations like the unhcr or the world food program are currently utilizing the blockchain to issue out um identity identity identity cards the UN has designed um a has designed an initiative which will basically apply the blockchain identity registration service to areas that are region specific so like in areas like Jordan or in Syria in order to alleviate an issue of lack of identity the unhcr has launched the population registration and identity management ecosystem or it's shortened to Primes crimes is basically an initiative and this initiative is a collection of Information Services that promises the refugees um a recognized legal identity that will be tied to biometric ID in Jordan the un's world food program has launched an initiative called building blocks and this initiative is basically designed to help the world food program distribute cash for food for food Aid and to over hundreds of thousands of refugees who are currently stranded in Jordan foreign however in order to um sign up for this program refugees are required to submit um are basically required to submit personal information and biometric data once again which will be stored in an experimental um storage facility on a centralized un server centralized storages of biometric data which is tied to identity is extremely invasive and dangerous and while there is an obvious emphasis that you know forgery and counterfeit um needs to be prevented there also needs to be an emphasis added on the data security of the individuals in a way that allows for them to retain ownership of their information that they're providing requiring users to register personal information onto a centralized database and then tying their digital identity with Biometrics seriously violates the refugees privacy rights I don't believe that any of us would want to have to do an eye scan in order to register for a government-issued card what seems invasive to a lot of us is going to also be invasive to a lot of refugees as well and we have to be mindful of these actions when we are creating um tools to address their problems there needs to be an effort made to protect the data and the privacy of refugees how can this technology be leveraged in such a way that just that dramatically improves the quality of life of most marginalized groups without asking them to compromise more than they have already given the answer May lie with a concept called self-sovereign identity management systems self-sovereign identity management systems are a digital ID system that is built on top of the blockchain technology where the information is being provided by and continues to be owned by the user and in this case the user would be the refugee the displaced person the Asylum Seeker the individual who needs a form of ID in their desperation they're not required to have to give up uh ownership of their information to a centralized entity they are able to retain that ownership of their information this framework of digital identity gives power back to the individual and it allows for them to control and gate key access to their digital identity um as it's being contained within their wallet whether it is um a portable a portable wallet in a larger meta system or if it's in um our uh or if it's in a portable wallet that they're able to carry around with them for example like something like a meta mask as we are building this future where blockchain technology becomes ever more infused into our daily lives we also need to be making a similar value code applied um to the tools that are being developed for marginalized and underserved communities which means protecting their privacy thank you we can Implement um privacy layers such as selective disclosure or zero knowledge proofs um in order to add an added in order to add an added layer to protect their privacy selective disclosure essentially means that um the individual who owns the the information is able to generate a proof from the attributes of the credential so for example um for example if you are uh you know going to the liquor store and you would need to basically purchase a bottle you would need to um show a piece of ID to demonstrate that you are above the legal drinking age in order to show that you're above the drinking the legal drinking age you shouldn't have to succumb to also brandishing your um your home address as well so the selective disclosure basically would allow the individual to um generate a proof that they are above the age of that they are above the legal drinking age and they are able to purchase um the alcoholic beverage the next tool um is a zero knowledge proof and in a zero knowledge proof basically you're able to attribute from the credential without necessarily having to reveal um anything personal so for example um in the example that I had had been talking about earlier if you're trying to purchase some alcohol and you need to verify that you're above the legal drinking age um zero knowledge proof would basically allow you to prove that you're above the legal that you are above 18 years old without having to necessarily reveal the exact date of rebirth yeah foreign I would like to I would like for us to consider um this concept of a self-sovereign identity uh registry as a hyperstructure and uh a hyper structure as Jacob had presented during the technical Summit here at Global a few days ago um would be an ideal model for a user-driven ID management system and his presentation uh Jacob defined hyperstructures as being crypto protocols that can run for free and forever without the need for maintenance interruption or intermediaries they basically would be running entirely on chain and they are a public good which would create a positive sum for any participant hyperstructures are transparent they are unstoppable free valuable expansive permissionless decentralized incredibly neutral which essentially means that they are free of politics um if anybody has not had the chance to um listen or watch Jacob's presentation I would I would highly recommend giving that a watch um because the way that he had ended up describing the functionality of hyperstructure was what inspired uh which is actually what you know crossed some T's and dotted some eyes for me when I was coming up uh with this presentation myself Sovereign identity would essentially act as a base structure for a uh would act as a base structure and it would be supported by the blockchain um and I and as it being a base structure we would be continuously building on top of it an ID system operating as a hyperstructure would allow ID to be portable and accessible anywhere an absolute necessity for refugees and displaced persons as they are trying to reach their next destinations an ID hyperstructure if the International Community recognized it as an incredible form of identification would essentially act as an interoperable Global ID card should a refugee arrive from Libya in Italy the Border officials could check their Identity On The Ledger housing the refugee's ID what makes this revolutionary is that the refugee could then choose to reveal only as much about themselves as needed for the particular transactions they are undertaking utilizing the Privacy tools we talked about earlier this would restore control and ownership of the information right back to the refugee and Empower them an efficient ID management system requires efficient coordination at the local the national and the international level as well as coordination between governments between non-governmental organizations and between private sector actors democratizing web 3 and the blockchain may look like creating a decentralized hyperstructure as a foundation for an internationally recognized and accepted self-sovereign identity system well the first layer of self-sovereign identity hypersocial May focus on the IAD Essentials such as name date of birth country and country of origin and perhaps family size the implication of a permissionless structure indicates that more apps and tools can be built on top of the hyperstructure so this means that later developments may allow users to verify their education their employment history and so on there is a serious need for impact-driven solutions to some of the issues that the most marginalized groups of our society is continuing to face and these issues are becoming more and more exacerbated As Time compounds the impact driven blockchain Solutions the future Society requires it does not compromise the values of web 3 when they're being developed for marginalized groups self-sovereign identity systems operating on the blockchain have the ability to hedge against political turmoil and enable refugees to maintain power and dignity of proven identity despite the political collapse of their nation's government and their physical circumstances refugees who are forced to abandon their Homeland and lost connection with any physical evidence of their past are now losing ways of establishing a future having an ID is such a crucial form to participate in an economy and to resettle into society blockchain is an opportunity for us to protect the audit to for us to protect the identity of refugees and to provide ownership of their credentials refugees become empowered once again when we approach ID ownership from a user-focused approach as the focus will be to protect the personal identity of the individual foreign I bring these topics up because we deny ethical progression of our society when we put blinders on and ignore the needs of underserved communities we commit a disservice to humanity by not actively seeking ways in which we can develop blockchain technology to improve their lives impact-driven Solutions are approaching problems thoughtfully and intentionally it is utilizing our time our talent our resources in ways which will advance Equity effective Effectiveness and system chains in our world moving forward thank you everyone for your time and thank you and African nft Community for the opportunity to speak here today awesome thank you so much Leona that was super super interesting um well looks like you have a question in the chat okay I see so thank you for good okay so could we see a demonstration or a website um this is something that I have been working on um and for a something over a year now um once I do have something tangible like a website I will definitely um showcase and share that with you guys but as of right now I don't have anything I would be able to provide um other examples individuals are utilizing self-sovereign identity so um I know that emerged tech labs um is an example who is using uh self-sovereign identity uh systems in order to empower um marginalized groups and allow them to have a mechanism to you know carry ID documentation with them I think that they also add another layer where they allow a more holistic approach to the individual so um people are also able to include like employment history um diplomas any education that they may have um and that sorts onto onto the application so that one is an incredible development it's called emerge tech labs um I'm trying to think of another self-sovereign identity program I think it's called Titan Titan Tech there are another um self-sovereign identity platform I think they were based in the Middle East as well I'm going to say turkey but they're doing some fantastic work with trying to empower individuals um by giving them ownership of their identity no problem you're awesome thank you for showing up they said thanks awesome I think that's all the questions we have for today um Leona that was really really interesting I also really enjoyed um like listening to this talk I'm really excited to see like where this technology can take us um in terms of like these types of like situations and use cases um and like thank you so much for taking the time to do this for metabolism um and also short notice as well and yeah and thank you to the rest of you for joining in listening to Leona's Workshop um yeah I appreciate everybody for coming in thank you Anna the global um ANC Community again for um giving me the platform to even talk about this I feel like I've been ranting about the potentials of self-sovereign identity to uh my community for so long now they're just like talk about it go so it was great to you know have the platform and I appreciate you guys immensely thank you for sure um and yeah with that being said I guess I can end this here and I hope everyone has a great rest of their weekend bye everyone bye everybody